IT HAPPENED ON DECEMBER 13TH

 

  863 Boudouin with the Iron Arm married Judith, daughter of Charles de Kales

1545 Council of Trente the 19th ecumenical council opens

1642 Dutch navigator Abel Tasman discovers New Zealand
1577 Sir Francis Drake sets sail from England to circumnavigate the world
1833 HMS Beagle with Charles Darwin aboard arrives in Port Deseado, Patagonia

1843 "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens first published

1903 Wright Brothers make maiden flight at Kittyhawk

1903 Italo Marcioni patents ice cream cone in New Jersey

1913 the Mona Lisa which was stolen in Aug 1911 returned to the Louvre

1916 Avalanche in the Tyrol kills 10,000 Austrian and Italian troops in 24 hrs

1918 U.S. Army of occupation crosses Rhine and enters Germany
1918 Wilson, becomes the first serving president to make a foreign visit (France)
1919 Ross and Smith land in Australia after flying from London

1920 League of nations establishes International Court of Justice in The Hague

1928 Clip-on tie designed
1938 Los Angeles freezes at 28ø F

1939 Battle of the River Plate between 3 British cruisers and the German Graf Spee

1941 U-81 torpedoes British aircraft carrier Ark Royal
1943 150 U.S. Marauders bomb Schiphol
1944 Japanese kamikaze pilot crashes into U.S. cruiser Nashville killing 138
1949 Knesset votes to transfer Israel's capital to Jerusalem
1951 Future British Prime Minister Margaret Roberts marries Denis Thatcher

1959 Archbishop Makarios elected first president of Cyprus

1966 U.S. bomb Hanoi for the first time
1967 Unsuccessful coup against Greek King Constantine II

1974 Malta becomes a republic

1976 Longest non-stop passenger flight 13hours 14mins (Sydney to San Francisco)

1977 14 University of Evansville basketball players die in plane crash

1978 the first U.S. coin to honor a woman, the Susan B. Anthony dollar is issued

1979 Strikes against price increases in Gdansk Poland

1981 Polish government declares martial law and arrests Solidarity activists

1982 a major Earthquake hits Northern Yemen killing 2,000

1990 Heavy earthquake strikes Sicily, 18 die

1993 Fire in textile factory in Fuzjou China, killing 60
1994 American eagle commuter plane crashes in North Carolina, killing 15